And, of course, the circuitous route of clicking on links on the web, following the path from book to author to book.  I “let [...]]]> There are so many ways to add to our book wish lists and to-be-read stacks:

• impulse purchases (“oh, that cover!”)
• reading through an author’s back list
• book group selections
• reviews (traditional/print and blogs)
• recommendation of a friend
• gifts

And, of course, the circuitous route of clicking on links on the web, following the path from book to author to book.  I “let my fingers do the walking” (apologies to the Yellow Pages) last week, and discovered that an author whose novel I really liked has also published a collection of short stories.

Debra Dean’s The Madonnas of Leningrad was published by HarperPerennial in 2007.  This is the story of Marina, a Russian born around 1920, who works as a docent in the Hermitage Museum. During the Siege of Leningrad, she, and other museum employees and volunteers, pull the paintings and statues from the exhibit halls, bringing them to the museum basement for safe storage; empty frames and bare bases mark the spots where the artwork had been on display. Marina creates a “memory palace,” and is able to walk through the empty museum with a full mental picture of each piece.

Six decades later, Marina is living in the United States, an 82-year-old woman suffering from Alzheimer’s disease.  She’s unable to live in the present, but her mind takes her back to Leningrad and the sharp memory of her younger days.  Dean layers the two time periods to make connections between the Siege of Leningrad by the Germans and the siege of her mind by Alzheimer’s.  It’s a wonderful story that looks at resilience and the power of memory.

If you haven’t yet read it, pick it up!

I picked it up – literally, off a stack off mis-filed books – and returned it to its proper place (fiction shelves, under D, of course!).  I wondered if Debra Dean had written anything else in the past four years, and headed to my friend google to find out.

Well, yes, she has!  In 2008, Dean’s short fiction collection, Confessions of a Falling Woman, was published by HarperPerennial.  It’s now firmly in place on my wish list!  Have you read it?

What other ways are books added to your wish list and TBR?

First, I want to thank everyone who joined me in planning The Week Ahead during August and September.  I’ve enjoyed keeping up with you all, including:

I gave everyone one entry for each The Week Ahead [...]]]>

First, I want to thank everyone who joined me in planning The Week Ahead during August and September.  I’ve enjoyed keeping up with you all, including:

• Ti at Book Chatter and Other Stuff
• Bree at The Things We Read
• Shannon at Confuzzled Books
• Stephanie at And Life Goes On …

I gave everyone one entry for each The Week Ahead post they wrote during the past two months.  The randomly-selected winner of the Book Lover’s Page-A-Day Calendar is …. Bree!  Congratulations, Bree!  Please send me your mailing address and I’ll get the calendar out to you. 

The feedback has been that planning ahead has been useful (I know it helps me stay on track, or at least know where the track is!); keep on doing it, I may run another incentive after the first of the year.  Here’s what’s on tap for me this week:

Monday 10/6 -  It’s after one o’clock, and I’m just writing my planning post now … enough said!

Tuesday 10/7 - Time for Tuesday Thingers!

Wednesday 10/8 – This week’s Spotlight on Bookstores is a guest post by Shana at Literarily.  She’s going to tell us about an independent bookstore with phenomenal author events and great staff recommendations.  Something to keep in mind for a rainy day.

Thursday 10/9 – LM4 starts a new afternoon storytime program at our local library.  My other kids have no school due to the Yom Kippur holiday, so the whole gang will walk down for some library fun.  They’ll probably convince me to stop for hot chocolate or ice cream (weather dependent, this is New England!) before we head home.

Friday 10/10 – And sometime this week, with Friday being my deadline, I plan to post reviews for several books I’ve enjoyed but haven’t yet blogged about.  They are:  Guernica by Dave Boling, The Madonnas of Leningrad by Debra Dean and Run by Ann Patchett.  Also, I was fortunate to see Joshua Henkin (Matrimony) at a book reading yesterday; that post is coming up this week, too.

That’s my week in a nutshell … lots of catching up and housekeeping it looks like!

I’m posting my Week Ahead a day earlier than usual this week – it’s going to be a busy week!  There’s a lot happening here and on other book blogs in conjunction with Book Blogger Appreciation Week … check out this partial listing of what’s going on in my little corner of the world:

Monday 9/15 – I’m [...]]]>

I’m posting my Week Ahead a day earlier than usual this week – it’s going to be a busy week!  There’s a lot happening here and on other book blogs in conjunction with Book Blogger Appreciation Week … check out this partial listing of what’s going on in my little corner of the world:

Monday 9/15 – I’m starting the week out as a tour host for Kathleen McCleary’ novel House & Home, working with TLC Book Tours.  I’ll have a book review and themed giveaway posted today!

Tuesday 9/16 – A bonus guest post by Kathleen McCleary, which will also serve as an early Spotlight on Bookstores this week.  If you’ve read the novel, you may be curious about the origins of “The Hole in the Wall” bookstore …

Also, I’ll be announcing the winner of Joshua Henkin’s Matrimony today (enter by midnight on Monday 9/15 for your chance to win an inscribed copy of the paperback!)

And, if that’s not enough … today is the day that BBAW intereviews with bloggers will be online.  She Is Too Fond of Books will have a VIP guest that I’m thrilled to interview; now it’s your turn to get to know her better …

Wednesday 9/17 – BBAW award presentations begin today!  Click over to My Friend Amy’s blog for the complete schedule (her blog should be on your “Favorites” or in your Google Reader … read early, read often!).  I can’t wait to watch all the award-winners walk the red carpet … will Joan Rivers be there critiquing what everyone’s wearing?

Thursday 9/18 – I have a few reviews to post this week, look for The Madonnas of Leningrad and Guernica.  Interesting connection between these two novels, each has a story line that involves removing art from museums in order to protect the masterpieces during a war.  Read the Comments below to find out which museum and which war in each case.

Friday 9/19 – I’ll have my weekly Friday Finds post, sharing the books that have come into my life over the week.

And, ahoy, matey!  September 19 is International Talk Like a Pirate Day! (I’m not kidding!)  Practice your “yo ho ho”s and “arrr”s while reading one of our favorite children’s books, How I Became a Pirate by Melinda Long and illustrated by the ever-amusing David Shannon.  You can translate any phrase into pirate-speak at the official site of Talk Like a Pirate Day; try it, it’s fun!

OK, time for me to put my feet up and relax for a bit before the week begins   I’m going to just sit back and crack open a book …  What are you most looking forward to this week?!

There’s still time to join us in planning “the week ahead”, and to enter to win a Page-A-Day Book Lover’s Calendar.  Find the details here:

A snapshot of what may, or may not, happen in my life this week:

Monday – We were away this weekend, so much of my day will be spent recovering from that [...]]]>

There’s still time to join us in planning “the week ahead”, and to enter to win a Page-A-Day Book Lover’s Calendar.  Find the details here:

A snapshot of what may, or may not, happen in my life this week:

Monday – We were away this weekend, so much of my day will be spent recovering from that – laundry and grocery shopping!  We were down the Cape visiting with friends at their family’s beach “lodge” – thank you Hilary and Tony (et al!).  The original structure of the Lodge was built as a fishing shack in the 1700s, it has been extended and updated throughout the years and has quite a bit of character.  As soon as we pulled down the gravel driveway and saw the building I said, “It’s The Big House!”, which was met by my children eye-rolling “of course it’s a big house”.  No, it reminded me of my mental picture of The Big House: A Century in the Life of an American Summer Home by George Howe Colt.

Tuesday – TuesdayThingers, in which the Boston Bibliophile poses a question, somehow related to the LibraryThing site.  I also hope to have my review for Christopher Meeks’ short fiction collection, Months and Seasons, ready to post. 

Wednesday – I’ll post the next installment in my SOBs series, a photo and short blurb about R. Franklin Pyke Bookseller in Avalon, California, which was discovered by Lisa at Books on the Brain while on vacation recently.  We don’t have a lot of information about this bookstore; if you can add anything, feel free to Contact me or Comment on the post.  If there’s a special bookstore that you’d like to spotlight, please let me know!

Thursday – Tonight Book Club Girl will interview Debra Dean, author of The Madonnas of Leningrad.  If you have a quesion or comment for the author, you can call in (or e-mail your question to Book Club Girl ahead of time). 

Friday - Today’s the last day to enter the drawing for a copy of Andrew Davidson’s The Gargoyle.  The winner’s name will be posted on Saturday.

They call it the Free Books for a Year Sweepstakes, I call it AMAZING!  The winner gets a dozen copies of a twelve specially-selected books; that’s enough to keep your book group busy for a year (or more if you take a summer hiatus)!!

Titles include: